An interactive exploration of urban planning — from zoning and budgets to road networks and population growth. Shape a city with your own decisions.
Click a zone type below, then paint cells on the grid to design your city's land use. Zoning determines where people live, work, and play — the foundation of all city planning decisions.
Allocate your city's annual budget across departments. Watch how shifting funds changes your city's quality ratings. Every dollar is a tradeoff.
Explore different road network topologies. Each pattern has tradeoffs in cost, connectivity, and resilience. Click a pattern to visualize it.
Trace the evolution of modern urban planning through key milestones. Click each era to learn more.
Model how different policy choices affect population growth over 30 years. Adjust parameters to see projected outcomes.
Combining residential, commercial, and cultural uses within neighborhoods reduces commutes, creates vibrant street life, and makes transit viable. The 15-minute city concept embodies this.
Concentrating density along transit corridors maximizes infrastructure ROI. For every $1 invested in public transit, cities see $4-5 in economic returns through land value uplift.
Parks, urban forests, and bioswales aren't luxuries — they're infrastructure. They manage stormwater, reduce heat islands by 2-8°C, and increase adjacent property values by 8-20%.
Sprawl costs 2-3× more per capita in infrastructure than compact development. Cities must balance growth ambition with the long-term maintenance obligations they create.
Great cities ensure no neighborhood is more than a 10-minute walk from parks, transit, schools, and grocery stores. Spatial equity is the foundation of social equity.
Climate-ready cities design for the 100-year flood today. Flexible zoning, redundant infrastructure, and modular systems let cities evolve without full rebuilds.